By Chris Oddo | Wednesday December 19, 2018
Alex de Minaur was the young player on the ATP Tour that best exemplified the warrior spirit.
Photo Source: AP
Welcome to the inaugural Tennis Now 25, where we celebrate the best popcorn moments of the 2018 tennis season, and award 25 “Popcorn Awards” to honor the most breathtaking and memorable performances of 2018.
About the Awards:
The #TN25 is designed not simply to remember the best matches, comebacks or Grand Slam performances. What we aim to accomplish here is to dig deeper into the archives so that we may celebrate some of the more offbeat and difficult-to-quantify performances.
This is our first time doling out these awards, and our attempt to veer away from the typical year-end rundown is genuine in that we feel it echoes the season of giving. What we aim to give is praise and thanks to those who made the season memorable on many levels...
Surely, with this being a new process for our editorial staff, there will be a few bumps along the road. Here and there we suspect that our valued readership may find a few things to disagree with (suprise!). If that’s the case, take to social media using the hashtag #TN25 and tell us what we missed or where we could have done better.
As the players like to say after they win their titles--none of this would have been possible without you guys, and that’s why we are going to put some of the awards to a Twitter vote in December, so stay tuned for that.
But for now, we must get to the awards…
Best ATP Teenager: Alex de Minaur
The Best Teenager Award goes to the best player aged 20 and under on tour by the start of 2019.
And the winner is... Alex de Minaur
Rising 19-year-old Alex de Minaur was in the running for the ATP’s best fighter award, but it eventually went to a very worthy Rafael Nadal. When it comes to this category, however, we feel that the Aussie has no equal.
De Minaur burst onto the scene in 2018 and climbed over 170 rankings spots to finish the season at No.31 in the world. Along the way the Aussie captivated fans with his blazing speed, his battle lust and intensity and his penchant for winning dramatic matches.
De Minaur reached finals in Sydney, Washington D.C. and at the Next Gen Finals and along the way solidified his reputation as a star in the making and a never-say-die competitor that could be headed for a Top 20 ranking in 2019.
De Minaur edges a very worthy Denis Shapovalov for this award. While the Canadian—also a remarkable talent, and also likely destined for a Top 20 ranking in 2019—had more success against that Top 20 than De Minaur, it is his lack of a final appearance in 2018 that hurts him.
It felt a lot like a toss-up between these two talented youngsters—unfortunately we could only pick one for the award.